Tuesday, November 24, 2009

Trader Joe’s Milk Chocolate Hazelnut Delights

Trader Joe's Milk Chocolate Hazelnut DelightsIt’s that lovely time of year when Trader Joe’s trots out oodles of holiday candies and treats.

I like to cruise the aisles and look at all the great new and returning items. This year my eyes lit on the Milk Chocolate Hazelnut Delights.

The box describes them as a crunchy hazelnut treat surrounded with praline, crispy wafer and milk chocolate. While I assumed that they are like Ferrero Rocher, the image on the box didn’t quite show whether they were flat or round (maybe the wafer is just that, a little disc). The box is also rather deep, and though it holds 7.05 ounces, I wasn’t sure how the items were packaged. Were they individually wrapped and just tossed in there? How many came in a box? Were they in a tray or just stacked up?

When I got the box home and opened it, most of my questions were answered.

Trader Joe's Milk Chocolate Hazelnut Delights

Inside the trapezoidal box are two trays. Each tray is sealed in cellophane and has eight sections. (16 candies total in the box.) Each little spot holds a Hazelnut Delight. At this point I confirmed that there were a heck of a lot like a Ferrero Rocher. They’re also made in Germany, which is one of the locations that Ferrero has manufacturing facilities.

The ingredients are impressive at first. The first item on the list is hazelnuts. After that it gets a little less enchanting. Ingredient #2 is sugar, which is absolutely expected in candy. #3 is vegetable oil (palm, rapeeseed and sunflower) and only after that do we get to the cocoa butter, wheat flour, chocolate liquor, whole milk powder, nonfat dry milk and cocoa ... then a bunch more stuff including more oils.

Trader Joe's Milk Chocolate Hazelnut Delights

The pieces are slightly larger than one bite. It’s a lumpy, bumpy ball and most had a little drizzle of white chocolate across them. What’s nice is that they’re not individually wrapped in foil, so it smells amazing, like roasted hazelnuts and hot chocolate.

Biting into one, the construction will seem similar. It’s a milk chocolate shell covering crushed hazelnuts stuck to a hollow wafer sphere. Inside is a chocolate and hazelnut paste ... somewhere in there is a whole hazelnut.

The amazing part though is the hazenuttiness. It’s just packed with them. It’s a sweet treat, but there’s both the whole hazelnut at the center plus the crushed hazelnuts then that hazelnut paste in the middle. There must be the equivalent of three or four hazelnuts in there.

The chocolate coating is sweet and melts easily. The paste in the center is, well, pasty. It’s sticky and has a good cocoa flavor but not much on the hazelnut side, not a problem there, because the whole hazelnut pretty much takes care of that at some point. (In the photo cross-section I obviously hadn’t found it yet.) The wafer is crunchy and has a light caramelized sugar note to it, like good ice cream cones do. The crushed hazelnuts steal the show though, so crunchy and with such a distinctive roasted nut flavor I was quite enamored of these little delights.

The price is a bit steeper than Ferrero Rocher (which I’ve seen on sale at drug stores for less than 1/2 the price from time to time). But there are far more hazelnuts here and of course they were extremely fresh. I might buy them again as a hostess gift for someone I was certain is a hazel-nut. I think I’d prefer a dark chocolate version for myself.

Other items returning for 2009:
Dark Chocolate Covered Mint Joe Joe’s
Trader Joe’s French Truffles
Trader Joe’s Irish Cream Chocolates
Trader Joe’s Peppermint Bark White Chocolate Bar
Trader Joe’s Dark Chocolate Sea Salt Caramels (different box this year)
Trader Joe’s Fleur de Sel Caramels
(I’ve also picked up their Belgian Chocolate Fancies, Dark Chocolate Orange and the Dark Chocolate Crisps to review in the next few weeks. Brandy Beans are also back this year, I didn’t pick them up when I was in Oakland - the first place I’ve seen the this year - but I’ll try to find them again.)

Related Candies

  1. Hachez Edel Vollmilch Nuss (Milk Chocolate with Hazelnuts)
  2. Doulton Liqueur Chocolates (Cointreau & Teacher’s)
  3. Short & Sweet: Hazelnut Bites
  4. Ferrero Prestige (Ferrero Garden)
  5. Ferrero Rocher
  6. Ferrero Mon Cheri
Name: Milk Chocolate Hazelnut Delights
    RATING:
  • 10 SUPERB
  • 9 YUMMY
  • 8 TASTY
  • 7 WORTH IT
  • 6 TEMPTING
  • 5 PLEASANT
  • 4 BENIGN
  • 3 UNAPPEALING
  • 2 APPALLING
  • 1 INEDIBLE
Brand: Trader Joe's
Place Purchased: Trader Joe's (LaBrea & 3rd)
Price: $3.99
Size: 7.05 ounces
Calories per ounce: 164
Categories: Chocolate, Nuts, Cookie, Germany, Trader Joe's, Christmas, All Natural

POSTED BY Cybele AT 11:36 am Tracker Pixel for Entry    

Comments
  1. ruffy's avatar

    really curious about the Belgian Chocolate Fancies… i had a box in my hand but ended up putting them back since i’m trying to behave this holiday season smile

    Comment by ruffy on 11/24/09 at 12:10 pm #
  2. They really look like Ferrero Rocher.
    For $3.99, it’s alright.  I should check it out.

    Comment by (( Ms. K. )) on 11/24/09 at 12:36 pm #
  3. These look exactly the same as the ones you can buy in Marks and Spencer’s in England! Interesting indeed.

    Comment by Rachel on 11/25/09 at 10:26 am #
  4. I just tried these the other day - I must admit they don’t just look and smell amazing - they taste fantastic!

    If you like this, I’m sure you guys would love Bacio, an italian chocolate. It’s produced by Perugina (nestle) and I think you should be able to buy it online if you want it smile

    Comment by Giorgio Vacini on 11/25/09 at 11:08 am #
  5. Am going to TJ’s soon and will definitely check these out.

    Comment by Pam Walter on 11/28/09 at 1:25 pm #
  6. oh my I want to write for your blog! Those look amazingly like a Ferrero Rocher which I LOVE!

    Comment by laura on 11/29/09 at 9:21 am #
  7. I came here to say that these are identical to the “Operetta” candies from Marks & Spencer, that I was just eating. But I was beaten to it! :D
    Even the inner wrapping, and the little white chocolate decoration on them it the same.

    Comment by Nivaya on 11/29/09 at 12:35 pm #
  8. Wow! These are so yummy… something I wanna try! I’m so addicted to Ferrero!

    Comment by u8mypinkcookies on 11/29/09 at 3:36 pm #
  9. Are you sure that they have more hazelnut than Ferrero?  Ferrero has a whole hazelnut in the center, nutella (made from hazelnuts) and nuts on the outside too.

    Comment by Rita on 11/30/09 at 8:16 am #
  10. Cybele's avatar

    Rita -  no I’m not certain. However, the first ingredient in Ferrero Rocher is Milk Chocolate, the first ingredient on these was Hazelnuts. And they just tasted nuttier. It could just be that they were really fresh, or not being individually wrapped makes them seem nuttier.

    Comment by Cybele on 11/30/09 at 8:46 am #
  11. woohoo! i have been waiting for these for months. hazelnuts are my favorite, sadly it is so hard to find really good hazelnut/chocolate candies. thank goodness for these!

    Comment by rachel leah on 12/01/09 at 9:18 am #
  12. Dear Trader Joe ,

    Do you have any Ferraro Mon Cheri Hazelnut chocolate

    Comment by Jeremiah on 12/10/14 at 10:01 pm #
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